Re: Documenting software

Subject: Re: Documenting software
From: The Tech Writer <techwrtr -at- CRL -dot- COM>
Date: Tue, 30 Jun 1998 14:00:33 -0700

Depends on the software, its uses, and its users. The software I document
is for writing software. My audience is programmers. They *need* to know
what the program is doing behind the scenes so that they can get it to do
what they want it to. They *must* understand the concepts, otherwise they
won't be able to achieve their goals. All of this is non-UI stuff, and
takes up a large portion of our documentation.

OTOH, I worked at a company that did project management software. That
was primarily teaching the users how to use the UI. They didn't need to
know how the information was stored, or to learn any concepts. They just
needed to know how to complete specific tasks.

Audience analysis. That's where it's at.

-David Castro
techwrtr -at- crl -dot- com

On Tue, 30 Jun 1998, Katherin King wrote:

> For those of you who document software applications, how much of what
> you do is documenting the GUI and how much of it is documenting the
> underlying structure, the means by which the GUI is implemented? In
> other words, how important is it, do you think, for tech writers to
> understand the inner workings of the software?
>
> Kathy Stanzler
> Technical Writer
> Brooktrout Technology Inc.
> Southborough, MA
> (508) 786-9182
> kking -at- brooktrout -dot- com
>
>
>
>




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